Family Law

Many people assume that child support terminates automatically.  It's a bad assumption to make.  Child support will continue to run as long as the present order is not formally terminated, usually on the "record" of the court.

Child support runs until the minor child reaches age 18 and has graduated from high school but no longer than age 19 unless extraordinary circumstances warrant child support for an extended period of time in the discretion of the the court.  Such extraordinary circumstances may be severe epilepsy that is not controlled with medication, paraplegia or quadraplegia.

To correctly terminate child support simply file a Motion to Terminate Child Support stating that the name and date of birth of the minor child and indicating the minor child has reached the age of majority and that he or she graduated from high school.  If you have the date of graduation and the high school name that the child graduated from then you can put that in your motion for good measure. 

Schedule the motion for hearing and unless there is an objection, the court will usually grant the motion and issue a Termination Order.  Keep in mind that if you are being garnished for your child support you will need to fill out a CSS-1 Form and submit it to the Child Support Collections unit at the Providence Family Court so they will update their system to terminate the garnishment.   You will also want to obtain a certified copy of the entered Termination Order from the clerk's office so you can provide it to your employer and have your garnishment terminated immediately.

Authored by:

Christopher A. Pearsall, Esquire
PEARSALL LAW ASSOCIATES
571 Pontiac Avenue
Cranston, RI  02910
Phone:  (401) 354-2369

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